Photosensitive glass structures have been suggested for a number of micromachining and microfabrication processes such as inkjet printer heads, electrodes for high quality head phones, micro-lens arrays, positioning devices, and hollow microneedle arrays being developed for transdermal drug delivery and the withdrawal of body fluids for biomedical and other applications. Unfortunately, silicon microfabrication processes are long, difficult, and expensive. These microfabrication processes rely on expensive capital equipment; X-ray lithography and deep reactive ion etching machines which generally cost in excess of one million dollars each and require an ultra-clean, high-production silicon fabrication facility costing millions more.
Today's packaging has become the limiting element in system cost and performance for integrated circuit (IC) development. Assembly and packaging technologies have become primary differentiators for manufactures and the trend towards smaller form factor electronics in consumer markets are increasing performance demands. Traditional packaging approaches to address the needs in these “High Density Portable” markets, including FR4, liquid crystal polymers, and Low Temperature Co-Fired Ceramics (LTCC), are running into fundamental material limits. Customer requirements include smaller packaging layer thicknesses, even higher density interconnects, in-package thermal management and future optical waveguide capability.